


there is a flame that never dies

by ninemoons42



Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - All Media Types, X-Men: First Class (2011) RPF
Genre: Actors, Alternate Reality, Alternate Universe - Movie Fusion, Celebratory Kiss, Community: trope_bingo, First Kiss, Flirting, Inspired by Music, M/M, Musicals, Singing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-22
Updated: 2013-01-22
Packaged: 2017-11-26 12:16:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,990
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/650439
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ninemoons42/pseuds/ninemoons42





	there is a flame that never dies

title: there is a flame that never dies  
author: [](http://ninemoons42.dreamwidth.org/profile)[](http://ninemoons42.dreamwidth.org/)**ninemoons42**  
word count: approx. 1940  
fandoms: McFassy, Les Miserables [2012]  
characters: James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Tom Hooper, Hugh Jackman, Eddie Redmayne  
rating: PG  
notes: **Spoilers** for the 2012 Les Miserables movie. Apologies to the fans of Aaron Tveit and George Blagden.  
Written for [](http://trope-bingo.dreamwidth.org/profile)[**trope_bingo**](http://trope-bingo.dreamwidth.org/). Prompt: celebratory kiss. My card is [here](http://ninemoons42.dreamwidth.org/215352.html).  
Also written for the [McFassy Film AU Fest](http://mcfassy.livejournal.com/375453.html).

  
Hugh Jackman holds the last note for what feels like a very long time, until it’s all that Michael Fassbender has ever heard and might ever hear: it’s a note that sticks in his chest and shivers to the beat of his heart - or is it the other way around? Is Michael’s heart beating to that terrible beautiful note? Is everyone on the set caught and captured on that sound, all marking the time as it soars and soars? It’s as if the note is the song all on its own: distillation, all the words and all the emotions in one everlasting spasm of grief and entreaty and sadness.

Michael is not the only one to draw in a deep breath when Hugh finishes - and he is _definitely_ not the only one to wipe tears from his eyes afterwards, nor is he the only one who smiles when Eddie Redmayne abruptly leaps to his feet and embraces Hugh. No one on this set has heard Hugh perform _the whole song_ before now, least of all the man he’s supposed to be singing it _for_.

Michael sympathizes with Eddie, he really does. He might have already ruined the take because he’s obviously been weeping. Marius is supposed to be asleep as Jean Valjean sings over him; Eddie has clearly been listening instead, and looks all but overcome with emotion. As well he should. Hugh’s performance has been nothing short of stunning.

“Okay,” Tom Hooper says after he blows his nose, “we’re going to have to try that again tomorrow. Emotions are good but none of you were supposed to be showing them, yeah? So let’s have a little more stoicism next time, guys.”

“Or we could all put bloody ear plugs on,” someone says from the top of the barricade.

“Actually that’s a good idea,” Eddie laughs after a moment. “Sure, James, we’ll do that. But we had to listen to the song once, didn’t we?”

“Of course.” James McAvoy looks up from his contemplation of his red coat with watery eyes. “Super work, Hugh.”

“Thanks. Let’s see if we can duplicate it tomorrow, eh?” A wave of laughter follows Hugh off the set.

Little by little the other actors follow, and so do the crew, streaming after Tom. One of the ADs makes a hand signal over her shoulder, and someone starts turning off the lights.

Michael watches the set disappear slowly into deep blue shadow.

He is also still looking at the top of the barricade, where James is: where he is motionless, seemingly suspended in time and space and silence. An unmoving shadow in a long coat.

“James,” he calls up, uncertain. “Dinner? Sleep?”

“I - yes,” is the reply, after a terrible long moment.

Slowly James gets up from his perch; he sets the replica rifle and pistol and sword aside, and puts one of the flags back in place after he moves it on the way down.

Michael holds his breath all the way until James is on level ground - and then almost instantly has to do it again, because when James looks up there is still too much of Enjolras in him: specifically, Enjolras on the cusp between belief and despair.

There are days when he could want to kick James around for being so Method, and this is one of them.

He nearly reflexively reaches for one of the bottles scattered near his feet.

“Are you actually still in character?” James says, and now that is all him, mocking and sweet and amused. “Because really. Some Grantaire you are. We all know you’re getting drunk on _water_.”

“You’ve seen me drunk, James - ”

“More times than I care to remember, Michael - ”

“So are you really surprised Tom’s telling me to just _act_ drunk? I can’t be Grantaire and be drunk at the same time.”

“Because you’re the happiest drunk ever,” James says, and he cracks a grin, something boyish and lovely and _himself_ at last. “All right, all right. Point taken. And I’m not Enjolras now.”

“Damn right you shouldn’t be,” Michael mutters. “Come on. Back to the hotel. If we get through _Bring Him Home_ tomorrow, it’s still gonna be a hell of a _long_ day.”

“Because tomorrow we’re getting killed,” James says. “Between you and me, I think we’ve lost count of the number of times we’ve died. Tomorrow will be just another entry on the list.”

“Except that I’ve seen the stunt sheet for tomorrow,” Michael says. He can see the sleek black gleam of his motorcycle easily, now that the parking lot is almost empty except for the crew’s vehicles. “And you’re still on it. Why are you still on it?”

“Because this is the _only_ time I get to be _bloody Enjolras_.” James doesn’t sound irritated at all, even though he’s rolling his eyes at Michael. “And Enjolras dies right where everyone can see him. On stage, he’s on the barricade. Here, he’s out a damn window. Upside down. Eyes wide open. And people already know it’s me in the red coat. They’ve known for a while and they expect to see me - see my corpse. Maybe people can fake my face, use CG or something. But I really don’t think you can fake this,” he says, and he points at his own eyes.

Michael’s not sure whether he wants to smack that knowing smirk off James’s mouth or kiss it more firmly into place. “You are so fuckin’ full of yourself right now, aren’t you?”

“Hardly the first time,” James laughs. But the smile is gone by the time they’re actually standing next to the bike. “Besides, you don’t get to talk.”

“What,” Michael says, though he knows full well what James is talking about.

“I know who else is on the stunt list. And I read the notation next to his name.”

“Let’s talk about that at the hotel,” Michael says, suddenly, too suddenly. “Come on.”

With the wind whistling in his ears even when he’s wearing a helmet, it’s impossible for Michael to hear laughter or snide commentary - but he can _feel_ , and he feels James hang on for dear life and laugh all the way.

He’s grateful he’s otherwise preoccupied.

James knows _exactly_ what he does to Michael, especially when he laughs; especially when he’s planning something evil; especially when he’s right there in the moment.

Now James is all three, and there is a flame rising in Michael’s heart that has everything to do with the light in those startling blue eyes.

*

The second take of _Bring Him Home_ goes smoothly and perfectly - Hugh nails every note again, and no one on the set reacts because they’re none of them listening to him at all, and that is exactly how things should be.

The rest of the day passes by in a blur. Michael is told to join some of the other barricade boys in the sequence where they bang for help on the neighboring doors and get nothing but silence in return, and he does so: he looks up with entreaty in the smile plastered onto his face, and he is entirely unsurprised when his efforts prove futile, where the others around him weep and resign themselves to their fates.

Tom calls a two-hour break before they shoot the sequence in which the barricade is definitively taken.

Michael and James spend the time sitting next to each other in a dark corner, out of everyone’s way, until they’re both called up to the second-floor set.

Neatly concealed in the debris is a mess of cables and pulleys and a pair of wide cuffs that go around James’s ankles: the rig that will allow him to dangle out the window when his character is shot dead.

And on the other side of the rig is Michael: specifically, Michael is the counterweight in the system; he’s what will hold James in place, he’s what will keep James suspended.

“Are you guys sure that this is what you want to do?” Tom asks, watching them both with arms folded across his chest.

“I know I signed up for this,” James says.

Michael doesn’t miss the sidelong glance James throws at him. “I signed up for this, too.”

“Orestes and Pylades _indeed_ ,” Tom says, but he only looks kind in that lofty way of his. “On your own heads be it. We’re going to rehearse that bit with you now, boys.”

When Tom declares that it’s time for Take One, when they’re facing the bullets, Michael turns to James and holds his hand out - to find that James is already making the same gesture.

It’s easy to clasp hands, easy to exchange one final handshake.

Then James lifts his free hand, the one that is holding the bunched-up red flag, and the report is deafening, the smoke thick and dark.

Michael catches his breath and collapses to the floor in a heap.

James falls out the window.

Tom yells “Cut!”

 _...three, four, five,_ and the stunt team calls out downstairs. The rig whines and clatters alarmingly - but it holds, and it keeps James safe as they haul him back in to the second-floor set, and to safety.

“How is it,” James says, anxiously.

The answer to that is the horrendous whine of a loudspeaker and Tom shouting, “That’s a print, everyone, good work - we don’t have to do that again, and that means the two of you in the window and the guys holding guns on you,” and everything else he has to say is drowned out in a loud cheer, which includes all of the dead and all of the living.

Michael laughs and hauls James up to his feet. “Fuckin’ excellent, nailed it in one!”

“Good, because this rig is killing me!” James says - but it doesn’t seem to get in his way as he turns more completely towards Michael, as he throws his arms around Michael’s neck and whoops.

Michael grins back at him, and then he can’t help himself any more: there are no words for what he feels, exultation and amazement and something much wilder than all that, something he can’t name and can’t say out loud.

So he leans over and kisses James on the cheek.

“You’re amazing,” Michael offers, after a while. He’s grinning so widely it hurts, and he doesn’t care at all.

James looks startled for all of a minute before his grin is back, more blinding and more amazing and _far_ more reckless than Michael has ever seen it. “I’m not just amazing. I’m exceptional,” James drawls. He seems to be over-enunciating, accent getting thicker and more pronounced.

“I - yes, tell me something I don’t know,” Michael says.

James looks him right in the eyes.

Michael has a sudden image of himself being the deer in the proverbial headlights.

“Lots of things you don’t know yet, Fassbender,” is all the warning he gets, however, before James is swooping in and kissing him senseless.

Incongruously, Michael can hear the soldiers cheering them on, and Hugh laughing helplessly, and Eddie whistling very loudly in encouragement or good-natured ribbing or _something_ \- but that is just until he grabs James’s wrists and pulls him closer, or tries to, because James is already all but plastered along his front.

Michael doesn’t even think, he just does: he just kisses James back, with interest, with everything he still has left in him.

They’re not Enjolras and Grantaire, and thank _fuck_ for that - they’re James and Michael, and apparently that is all they have to be right now.  



End file.
